Here are the bills in the 2017 Florida Senate I've been keeping an eye on so far that have a positive effect on our legal ability to exercise our natural self defense rights as outlined in the Second Amendment:

128 - Burden of proof: This places the burden of proving that a person acted outside of the law when defending themselves on the prosecutor, where is belongs. (Passed by Senate in a floor vote, so far passed by House Judiciary Committee)

616 - Courthouse carry: This would allow you to carry your weapon into a courthouse and check it with security instead of leaving it in your car. (Passed by Oversight Committee, now in Rules Committee)

618 - Airport carry: This would allow you to carry concealed in any non-sterile areas of the airport. (No movement yet)

620 - Legislature meeting carry: This would allow you to carry at any legislative meeting. (No movement yet)

622 - Campus carry: This allows you to carry concealed on the grounds of a school campus, but not necessarily into any school building. (No movement yet)

626 - Municipality meeting carry: This would allow you to carry at any meeting of a municipal governing body. (No movement yet)

640 - Career center carry: This allows you to carry into any career center. (No movement yet)

644 - Open carry: This would allow anyone with a concealed weapons permit to carry openly. (No movement yet)

646 - Decriminalizes brief exposure: This decriminalizes brief, accidental exposure of a concealed weapon. (Temporarily postponed by Judiciary Committee on 3/28, will be rescheduled)

1052 - Enhances Stand Your Ground: Removes the requirement that a person in their home must be "attacked" in order to use deadly force. (Passed by Judiciary Committee, scheduled for Rules Committee on 3/29)

1330 - Church carry: Removes the ability of a church to ban carry on church grounds of the church houses educational facilities. (Passed by Judiciary Committee, now in the Education Committee)

Isn't brief exposure already decriminalized? Like, didn't they rewrite the original law to include provisions for it so you weren't brandishing?

790.053 Open carrying of weapons.—
(1) Except as otherwise provided by law and in subsection (2), it is unlawful for any person to openly carry on or about his or her person any firearm or electric weapon or device. It is not a violation of this section for a person licensed to carry a concealed firearm as provided in s. 790.06(1), and who is lawfully carrying a firearm in a concealed manner, to briefly and openly display the firearm to the ordinary sight of another person, unless the firearm is intentionally displayed in an angry or threatening manner, not in necessary self-defense.
(2) A person may openly carry, for purposes of lawful self-defense:
(a) A self-defense chemical spray.
(b) A nonlethal stun gun or dart-firing stun gun or other nonlethal electric weapon or device that is designed solely for defensive purposes.
(3) Any person violating this section commits a misdemeanor of the second degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082 or s. 775.083.
History.—s. 1, ch. 87-537; s. 173, ch. 91-224; s. 3, ch. 97-72; s. 1205, ch. 97-102; s. 3, ch. 2006-298; s. 1, ch. 2011-145.

It's not decriminalized. It's still left open to interpretation by LEO and when you expose the firearm for longer than the LEO prefers, he can cite you for a criminal violation, a second degree misdemeanor. If the bill passes, the violation is reduced to a NON-CRIMINAL fine of $25.

The problem with any pro-gun bills at this time is that Anitere Flores, a REPUBLICAN senator in judiciary committee is singlehandedly blocking all of them. She's siding with the democrats and is going to destroy any chance of pro-gun bills advancing at all. We must let the Senate President know that she is obstructing and that we will not stand for it. Send emails, or else most of the bills you see above are in jeopardy again, at the hands of an obstructionist republican. Before it was Diaz De la Portilla. Now it's Flores. Pieces of statist trash.

There are 18 days left in the 2017 Florida legislative session and there are well over a dozen pro-gun bills that have been proposed in the House of Representatives and in the Senate. Unfortunately, the Senate has made almost zero progress on most of these pro-gun bills and the House has spent most of it's time waiting on the Senate to send them their passed bills.

The result is that once again, we will be nearly stagnant on legislation that affects law abiding gun owners. We pride ourselves on being a very gun friendly state but we can't even pass some simple, common sense, gun Liberty legislation without a major knife fight with what is supposed to the friendly party members (Miguel Diaz de La Portilla and Anitere Flores, specifically).

If a state becomes stagnant and fails to move forward on gun liberties, eventually it will start moving backwards. Have any of you contacted any of the Florida Senators? We are nearly out of time this year, and next year is an election year, which basically means that only minor gun related bills will have any chance to see a committee meeting. We've got to move the ball forward in anticipation of an anti-Liberty backlash in 2018 and 2019.

The Florida legislative session has five days left and all of the nearly two dozen pro-gun bills authored for the Senate are dead in the water aside from a single improvement to the "stand your ground" law. We have republican weakness to thank for the last three years of stagnation and next year's nearly guaranteed inaction (it's an election year).

Anitere Flores (Miami) and René Garcia (Hialeah) are both republican senators on the Senate judiciary committee, and both have voiced opposition to pro-gun bills. Almost all gun bills must pass the judiciary committee. Flores has even recently stated that the senate is "gun bill fatigued" in an attempt to thwart future action.

It looks like we are going to have to be satisfied with the laws we have now. While the rest of the country is making progress toward open carry, campus carry, constitutional carry, etc., we are stagnant. That, despite having both chambers of the legislature, the AG office and the governor's mansion in the hands of republicans.

The Florida State Legislature wrapped up the 2017 session a few days ago, and unfortunately, all but three of the nearly two dozen pro-gun bills were killed in committee. The major hurdle for pro-gun bills in the Florida legislature is the Senate Judiciary Committee. The republicans maintain a technical 5-4 majority in the committee, however there are two republicans on the committee who have promised to side with the democrats on all future gun bills.

They are Anitere Flores (R-Miami) and René Garcia (R-Hialeah). This gives the democrats an unofficial 6-3 majority against pro-gun legislation. I personally contacted Senate President Joe Negron about the stonewalling, to no response. I also contacted my own senator, Doug Broxson, also to no response. The only person I could ever get a direct, personal response from was my Representative, Jayer Williamson, who assured me he supports open carry, campus carry and every pro-gun bill in the House.

It came to my attention that the possible reason that Anitere Flores changed her position on gun rights is becausethe lines in her voting district were redrawn to include the very left wing Florida Keys. I suppose she has gone into a sort of "survival mode" and has decided that left wing voters in the Keys are more important to her political survival than gun owners' rights. I predict she will pay for that mistake in next year's election, and it will serve her right.

As far as the gun bills that DID make it to the governor's desk:

SB-128 places the burden of proof in self defense cases back on the prosecution, where it belongs.

SB-1052 fixes a drafting effor by staff on a 2014 Castle Doctrine bill. The error has been interpreted to mean that a person must be under a physical attack before using defense in their own home.

HB-467 lowers the price of a new Florida CWL from $60 to $55, and a renewal CWL from $50 to $45.

https://freeamericannational.blogspot.com/2017/05/small-progress-for-gun-rights-in-florida.html?m=1

JBryan314 said:

Here are the bills in the 2017 Florida Senate I've been keeping an eye on so far that have a positive effect on our legal ability to exercise our natural self defense rights as outlined in the Second Amendment:

128 - Burden of proof: This places the burden of proving that a person acted outside of the law when defending themselves on the prosecutor, where is belongs. (Passed by Senate in a floor vote, so far passed by House Judiciary Committee)

616 - Courthouse carry: This would allow you to carry your weapon into a courthouse and check it with security instead of leaving it in your car. (Passed by Oversight Committee, now in Rules Committee)

618 - Airport carry: This would allow you to carry concealed in any non-sterile areas of the airport. (No movement yet)

620 - Legislature meeting carry: This would allow you to carry at any legislative meeting. (No movement yet)

622 - Campus carry: This allows you to carry concealed on the grounds of a school campus, but not necessarily into any school building. (No movement yet)

626 - Municipality meeting carry: This would allow you to carry at any meeting of a municipal governing body. (No movement yet)

640 - Career center carry: This allows you to carry into any career center. (No movement yet)

644 - Open carry: This would allow anyone with a concealed weapons permit to carry openly. (No movement yet)

646 - Decriminalizes brief exposure: This decriminalizes brief, accidental exposure of a concealed weapon. (Temporarily postponed by Judiciary Committee on 3/28, will be rescheduled)

1052 - Enhances Stand Your Ground: Removes the requirement that a person in their home must be "attacked" in order to use deadly force. (Passed by Judiciary Committee, scheduled for Rules Committee on 3/29)

1330 - Church carry: Removes the ability of a church to ban carry on church grounds of the church houses educational facilities. (Passed by Judiciary Committee, now in the Education Committee)

Click to expand...

So did they just drop the ball on the HPA ( Hearing Protection Act) ? That made Suppresor's non NFA items?

Florida Action Report! Gov. Rick Scott has SIGNED SB-128 & SB-1052
DATE: June 10, 2017
TO: USF & NRA Members and Friends
FROM: Marion P. Hammer
USF Executive Director
NRA Past President


Early yesterday evening, Friday, June 9th, Governor Rick Scott SIGNED INTO LAW the two critically important self-defense bills we have been urging him to sign.

One, SB-128 Burden of Proof by Sen. Rob Bradley and Rep. Bobby Payne restores the presumption of innocence in self-defense cases by putting the burden of proof BACK ON THE STATE where it belongs. SB-128 took effect IMMEDIATELY.

When prosecutors and judges use procedures to circumvent the rights of law-abiding people and the will of the Legislature, it cannot be tolerated.

Procedures do not have the weight of law and now the Legislature and the Governor have erased these abusive procedures in self-defense cases and have legislatively made sure these self-defense rights are reinstated. Pending cases should have the retroactive benefit of the Legislature and the Governor erasing these malicious procedures.

The second, SB-1052 Justifiable Use of Force by Sen. David Simmons and Rep. Cord Byrd corrects a 2014 drafting error (by a member of the House Criminal Justice Committee Staff) resulting in a requirement that citizens be under attack in their own homes before exercising self-defense – and in some circumstances imposing a duty to retreat from your home before exercising self-defense.

BACKGROUND on Burden of Proof:

In 2005, people who exercised self-defense were being prosecuted like criminals, and courts – with no legislative authority – were imposing a "duty to retreat" in self-defense cases.

Courts were instructing juries to find victims guilty if the victim had not tried to run away before fighting back against a criminal attack.

So the Legislature took action to restore the constitutional right of self-defense and created a specific, statutory right of immunity for people who defend themselves from attack.

That law prohibits arresting, detaining in custody, charging and prosecuting unless and until an investigation reveals there is probable cause to believe the act was not lawful self-defense.

But some prosecutors and judges didn't like it so they found a way to usurp the law and bypass the intent of the Legislature.

With no legislative authority, they created a special "Stand Your Ground" hearing and reversed the burden of proof from the state to the victim. Through case law, they changed a legislative law they didn't like.

They effectively created the presumption of guilt for the exercise of self-defense.

After conspiring to create an extra hearing in self-defense cases, prosecutors are now arguing that it would be ‘too much work for them' if the State has the burden of proof in this additional hearing and they actually have to prove their cases.

And in July, 2015, the majority of the Florida Supreme Court found that victims SHOULD have the burden of proof and prove they are "entitled to immunity provided by the Legislature." It is an outrageous opinion.

Supreme Court Justice Charles Canady and Justice Ricky Poltson strongly objected and in dissenting opinion, Canady wrote that the majority opinion, "Substantially curtails the benefit of the immunity from trial conferred by the Legislature under the Stand Your Ground law."

Further, he wrote that the majority "cannot justify curtailing the immunity ..."And that this problem is a matter for the Legislature to resolve.

In other words it's up to the Legislature to put it back. This bill fixes it. It places the burden of proof back on the state where it belongs. And it restores the right of the presumption of innocence and the right of self-defense.

Not trying to bring up an old thread but also didn't want to start a new one for the same issue.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/07/0...ound-law-ruled-unconstitutional-by-judge.html

Sent from my SM-S978L using Tapatalk

Already have one on that. He only ruled that a new amendment is unconstitutional. Law is still the law, though.